Troopers look for truck violations on Crossroads highways

Diana Singleton rolled her big truck to a slow stop coming off U.S. Highway 59 South.

The truck, from Sun Coast Resources out of Edna, rumbled under the beat of the hot sun, as Department of Public Safety troopers moved in with inspection books and creepers to get under the truck.

"Inspections - they are just part of the job," Singleton said as she pulled open the hood for a DPS trooper to look inside. "I mean, you don't want someone on the road with their breaks going out or something like it that causes crashes. None of us want that."

And getting those unsafe trucks off the road is exactly what the troopers are looking for during Roadcheck 2013, a three-day intensified inspection check of commercial vehicles from Mexico to Canada, said DPS Trooper Spokesman Gerald Bryant.

In the first four trucks inspected at the Inez weigh station, at least one had an out-of-service violation. Two others had violations that needed to be researched further, Bryant said.

Only one truck of the original four completely passed the inspection and moved on, after troopers checked breaks, tire pressure, instrument panels, lighting, equipment on the truck, driving log books and more.

In 2012, the same program took 21 percent of the 8,000 vehicles inspected off the road until repairs were made and 243 drivers were taken out of service for various violations, according to a DPS news release.

Bryant said the area troopers would be working random hours in the next couple days to operate the weigh station and enforce the law.

"Anytime there is a crash involving 80,000 pounds going down the road, it is going to be a very dangerous crash, so what we really want to do is make it safer - we don't want anything going wrong with that truck while it is driving down the road," Bryant said.

He said when the weigh stations are not operating, troopers and other law enforcement officers are patrolling, looking for dangerous vehicles.